My proposal for a musical theme for the Alt-West.

This is my proposal for a musical theme for the Alt-West civilizational movement, (of which includes elements of the alt-right). The alt-west is a celebration of man’s greatest achievement – Western Civilization. While it may be tempting to consider some stirring heavy metal martial music to inflame our warriors and inspire them to glorious deeds, military might was not the hallmark of Western Civilization.

The hallmark of Western Civilization was beauty.

Beauty uplifts us. It inspires us to be better. It inspires us to achieve and to be thankful for what we have.

But beauty has had a hard time of it over the past one hundred years. First art was made ugly and debased. Architecture soon followed. Literature was perverted into propaganda for minorities written by middle aged cat ladies who in a sane world wouldn’t get a job teaching English in high school. The progress of ugliness continues unabated as our once beautiful countrysides are debased with rows of gigantic metal wind turbines, acres of solar panels that incinerate birds in the sky, and rusting wave generators that despoil our beaches.

Music was not immune to this disease. The 20th century saw the death of classical music with the enthusiastic adoption of atonal music, a breathtaking embrace of getting the score wrong. Now the only sanctuary for classical composers is in the syrupy world of film scores, which has given us the delights of John Williams and his ilk, sure to be remembered for hundreds of years to come.

Composed by Ralph Vaughn Williams in 1910, a moment in time that could be considered the height of Western Civilization, Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis was inspired by the music of the English Renaissance. Williams traveled across the country in that time, collecting traditional English folk tunes, some dating back to the Middle Ages, so that they would be saved for posterity.

Posterity. A word loaded with meaning, and for our generations, a word loaded with failure. Vaughn Williams understood its importance, and he backed this knowledge with action. This piece of music is not just beautiful; its roots stretch back over a thousand years of Western history. And as a result it stirs the soul. A man of European descent cannot help but be uplifted by the sweeping sounds of three separate groups of a string orchestra as they work together to meld the layers of musical form into the musical equivalent of a silk tapestry.

This performance was conducted in Gloucester Cathedral, the same location where it was first performed for the public in 1910, an event that was conducted by the composer himself. I consider it to be the apex of greatness. It is no coincidence that it is my favorite musical piece. I hope that you agree with me as to its importance and to its capacity to inspire us and reawaken that which we have almost lost.

I’ve been immersed in classical music since my kids were in Orchestra in school. My youngest is now a music major. I can’t tell you how many concerts I’ve been to where the composer is present, and the orchestra plays four movements of motion sickness inducing noise. The composer comes out afterword, gushing, as I sit there wondering what the hell just happened and can I get that twenty minutes of my life back?

When my daughter asks how I liked it, I used to say “Meh..Not for me”, Then “It was a pile of dogshit, played expertly”. Now, if she asks, I simply stare. She warns my up front now.

If you have the talent, these schools are meant to cultivate it. Sadly, they also admit more mediocre fluffers than talent. I groan when I’ve traveled all the way to her school for a concert, and the conductor comes out to explain the piece they are going to play. That’s a doubleplus ungood sign. A sign your ears are in for a beating.

In all things art and music, there is objective beauty. You know when you see it, you know when you hear it. Sadly, many modern artists and composers plop a huge steamer, tell people it’s ice cream, and the crowds of sycophants, wannabees, and outright morons gabble around saying how wonderful that pile of shit tastes.

If you are lucky at these concerts, they’ll get this silliness out of the way first or second, and play Brahms, Mozart, or any real genius composer last.

I like it. It’s very unlikely something like this would have been produced after WW1. WW1 was a cultural turning point. It was effectively the end of the Enlightenment, and the end of optimism in the power of the individual – and the start of the cultural decline towards the current state of affairs.

But it does not reflect 1,000 years of European history; it reflects a few centuries of European history from the late Renaissance onwards, and primarily the Enlightenment. What was the West enlightened from in the Enlightenment? The religious based superstition that preceded it, and a philosophy that saw man has a slave of the gods rather than the master of his own destiny. Medieval folk music was nothing like this, in content nor spirit.

It’s also representative of the optimism that followed one of the most peaceful 100 years in European history, when movement across borders was relatively free (evidence of the maxim that if people can’t move freely over borders, then armies will).

As for “a man of European descent cannot help but be uplifted by the sweeping sounds European” – I wish that were the case, but most men of European descent these days would be deaf to music like this. But it might apply to a man of mature tastes, who recognises the value of Western Civilisation, whatever their DNA.